388 ANIMAL BIOLOGY 



for this biologist's work had been considered by many an economic 

 waste, to-day it is reported that the annual income tax on the 

 salary his services command from the oil industry repays many- 

 fold to the Government the annual grants that formerly were 

 made to him. (Figs. 20, 244.) 



Hence it is far from true that so-called pure science and applied 

 science are distinct and independent activities. There is only one 

 kind of science — science aspiring for truth and knowledge, and 

 there could be no application of science unless that knowledge pre- 

 viously existed. Great innovations are chiefly facile applications 

 of truths which their authors have pursued for their own sake, 

 and in our most theoretical moods we are frequently nearest to the 

 most practical applications. 



Indeed, some of the great biological generalizations with which 

 we have become familiar on previous pages have in everyday 

 affairs a profound practical significance which is easily overlooked. 

 For example, the cellular structure of all living things — imply- 

 ing the existence of a fundamental similarity in organization 

 throughout the living world. Again, the basically similar life-stuff, 

 protoplasm — demonstrating that all living nature is united by a 

 common bond not only of cellular organization but also of proto- 

 plasmic basis to which all life phenomena are referable. Still 

 again, the transformation by protoplasm of non-living material 

 into living material — proving that living matter is ordinary 

 matter peculiarly organized. And finally, organic evolution. All 

 nature is one. 



These and other great biological truths have a far-reaching im- 

 port to everyone, because collectively they unmistakably lead to 

 the grand conclusion that human life must be interpreted in terms 

 of all life. Man must conform to the general order of living nature 

 of which he is an integral but dominant part. Remove one of the 

 essentials of life and he perishes like the beasts. But he differs in 

 capacity to understand and to take advantage of circumstances. 

 Human welfare, therefore, demands that Man must 'control' 

 nature by consciously adapting himself to it. Indeed, the chief 

 purpose of education is the adaptation of the individual and the 

 promotion of adaptability — adjustment to the basic internal and 

 external conditions of life without a loss of plasticity. Thus biology 

 affords the natural foundation of the science and art of right living 

 which human welfare demands. 



